Mashnouq Meets Election EU Observer Team

Interior Minister Nouhad al-Mashnouq met on Friday with the EU's head of mission for electoral monitoring Elena Valenciano, in the presence of EU Ambassador Christina Lassen where talks focused on the logistic and technical preparations for the parliamentary elections, the National News Agency reported.

For her part, Valenciano said more than 100 observers will monitor the elections, noting that a group of them will be responsible for monitoring expatriates'voting across 10 EU countries on April 29, including Switzerland.

The National Institute for Democracy, led by former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, will also monitor the parliamentary elections through 30 observers who will be deployed in the 15 constituencies.

A team from the Arab League and another from the Arab Election Monitoring Network are expected to observe the elections as well, while the Carter Center will not be able to send observers, as it did back in 2009, for lack of funding, said NNA.

Lebanon will stage its first parliamentary elections in nine years on May 6.

The polls will be staged based on a complex proportional representation system in 15 electoral districts.

Here we don't have an electoral college to assure that the majority will not win the election so we need to get this EU team. In Lebanon we strive to emulate the USA, the world's greatest democracy ever, where two out of the last three presidents became president because the majority was not allowed to win the election.